


Unworldly Companion

by DITaran



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-01
Updated: 2018-11-01
Packaged: 2019-08-14 10:03:27
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,356
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16490483
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DITaran/pseuds/DITaran
Summary: To end up in late June 1914 in Sarajevo, on Earth of all places, had not been the intention. But that was what happened when using a Vortex Manipulator bought in a shady place from an equally shady person with credits that were only in one's possession because of some other shady business. And meeting the Doctor had not been the plan either. No one in their right state of mind would have willingly engaged with such a dangerous, powerful man with access to all of time and space. Fortunately, Chaziban had never been one to back down from a challenge, and if that meant disguising themselves as some meek, disgusting human to get back to a time and place with decent internet connection then so be it.





	Unworldly Companion

**Author's Note:**

> The idea for this story has been swirling around my mind for some years now. Encouraged by my dear friend, TheWorldIsYour13, I decided to finally sit down to write and to see where it leads me.

Unworldly Companion

### CHAPTER ONE

It should have been a journey like any other. Like the one from Bessan to Normian. A little jump, a little uncomfortable jump. As uncomfortable as jumps were when travelling through time and space with a Vortex Manipulator, purchased second-hand at a black market run at the far outreaches of the galaxy. So far out, in fact, that even the physics of gravitation had been affected. It was needless to say that ending up some ninety-three Earth years too early had not been among the Top Ten on Chaziban’s list.  
But here they were. In Sarajevo, the capital of the Kingdom of Serbia, on Earth, the Solar System. It was late June. June 1914. And the copy of _A History of Earth and Humanity_ they had sneaked out of Sister Stoneheart’s bookshelf spoke of an assassination attempt taking place on the 28th of June. A successful one, too. The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, and his wife Sophie Duchess of Hohenberg. Franz Ferdinand and Sophie were scheduled to die tomorrow. It was a Fixed Point in Time. 16 million people were to die because of it within the next four years. 16 million was a ridiculously small amount. On the first day on Bessan alone Chaziban’s ancestors had slain one million. Either those humans were reluctant killers, or incredibly hard to kill.  
A cart drawn by four large, four-legged creatures moved passed. Their paws slammed onto the stone loudly. Loud enough for the noise to echo along the street. Chaziban winced. They might have spent enough time studying these humans, these bizarre two-legged colonisers in secret to create a fool-proof illusion of one, but the hearing of their people had always been hailed to be one of the best, if not the best, of the galaxy. It had been his peoples’ attribute long before the First Conquest, back when they had been the oppressed, not the undefeated and powerful. Almost godlike. To be stuck among cockroaches, among humans who had not even invented holograms and hyperspeed, until they could find something or someone who could help them repair the Vortex Manipulator was the worst that could have happened. And given that they had fully expected to end up shattered and torn apart all across the galaxy that meant something.  
Chaziban sighed and let their gaze wander up and down the road. These people were so primitive. The only helpful speciman they had encountered so far had helped them up from the ground. A situation they had found themselves in thanks to the smoking Vortex Manipulator, which had proceeded to scorch their arm. That's what you got meddling with things that you had no business putting your nose into. But the order had been clear, and they had always been trying their best, doing his utmost to fulfil his family's wishes, to comply and not to disappoint. A young human, perhaps a bit younger than them (if the age conversion rate the _History of Earth and Humanity_ had spoken of could be trusted), stopped in front of them. Right in front of the lamppost they leant against.  
"Newspaper, sir?" asked the young human and offered them a thin pile of papers, which miraculously stuck together. They knew paper only from the books, from the stories the Elders told of days long gone.  
"I should think so, yes." Chaziban pried the pile of paper from between those thin fingers. It felt soft. So different than the ancient scrolls, which told of species long since dead. Of species that had been waged war on, defeated, conquered, and destroyed. "Sir, you need to pay for that," said the human.  
"What is it you pay with here?" asked Chaziban. They had nothing on them. It was safer to travel without valuables in case of space pirates. Those kind of people were utterly ruthless. Even more so than his own family, which did not happen that often. Less than once in a century, perhaps even less than once in a millennium.  
"With the dinar, sir." The human gave him an expectant look. Eyebrows raised and eyes widened. He held up one of his paws too. The bottom of it upwards. "If you cannot pay, you cannot have the newspaper."  
Chaziban tilted their head to the side. "Fascinating. You are not afraid of me." They continued before the human could interrupt. "You know what, I will keep this newspaper, you called it?  
I will pay you next time I see you." And without waiting for the little human to answer, Chaziban walked down the road. Newspaper in their hands. They would have to find a spot to read the _History of Earth and Humanity_ in peace, undisturbed by any of those two-legged nuisances. Or someone might actually accuse them of witchcraft or some other preposterous nonsense, merely because science seemed as far in the remote future as someone who knew how to fix a Vortex Manipulator. The fleeting conversations the cockroaches have as they pass them are almost... normal. Hopes, ambitions, dreams. Every day chit-chat, health issues, children.  
Things Chaziban's family discussed before the Brood Mother had decided to send them to Earth to deal with the mess left by their brothers and sisters, before the warning of some members of the Shadow Proclamation dropping by to check if certain laws were obeyed had come through.  
These humans were to be admired, Chaziban thought as they stepped onto what appeared to be a market (the Baščaršija it was called as they will find out later, much later, but they did not know that yet). They were so insignificant, so caught up in their own little messes that they had no idea what would happen tomorrow, and so naive that they were oblivious the world as they knew it was about to come to sudden end. They brushed past him, appeared out of nowhere, shouted to another, and the smell was nauseating on their empty stomach. It was time to eat. To find someone who would not be missed as the day dwindled, as June turned into July, as the year came closer to its end. If needed some smaller creature, some mammals not in human form would do as well. Of course, they could pull any one of them from the crowd, sneak them away unnoticed and devour them. Had it not been for that voice in the back of their head, this thing Sister Stoneheart's medical books called 'conscience'. A highly contagious disease that was. And no one could knew they might have contracted it, especially not the Brood Mother, that they could not eat anyone who they were not certain deserved punishment, deserved to be turned into a good dinner. A dinner that left you bloated, three times bigger than usual, and so full you vowed to never eat again.  
The noise was so faint, carried to their ears by the summer breeze, so unfamiliar like the language the humans spoke around them that Chaziban almost dismissed it as a human thing. Had it not been for the shiver, which ran down their spine. It was a sound so eerie that even the Brood Mother could not have accused them of cowardice for wishing themselves somewhere far, far away. It belonged to a ship of the Timelords, who should have all been more dead than the former population of Bessan. A ship which could travel through space and, more importantly, through time and take them precisely where they had wanted to pop out of the Vortex. But they would have to be cautious. Only one of the Timelords had survived the Time War, according to reports: The Doctor. It was better to be safe than sorry with this one, who was the stuff of legends because no matter how helpful that man the Elders referred to as The Doctor (some in hushed voices, although they would never admit that and rather kill anyone accusing them of it in cold blood) might turn out to be, he had a history of getting people killed, of getting into the way of justice, of history.


End file.
